National Health Survey in Cuba

HAVANA (ACN) The Cuban Health Ministry and the National Statistics and Information Office will carry out a national health survey this year aimed at learning the current situation of non-transmittable chronic diseases.

Dr. Esther Pallarol Marino, representative of the National Epidemiology Office of the Department of Non Transmittable Diseases told ACN that the survey will begin from the age of six.

According to the Third National Survey of Risk Factors and Non Transmittable Diseases held in 2010, 31 percent of the Cuban population over 15 years of age suffers from high blood pressure.

Cuba is one of the countries, after Canada and the United States with a high number of controlled high blood pressure patients (34 to 26 percent), said the specialist.

This motivated the World Health Organization to work up a project on the standardization of the treatment of the high pressure patient that is carried out at the Carlos Verdugo policlinic in Matanzas each year and will be extended to Cienfuegos and Villa Clara, she announced.

Dr. Pallarol Marino explained that among the results; patients that were hospitalized were able to get their blood pressure lowered and also the visits to the policlinic’s emergency room.

She stressed the success after the secondary intervention included in the project and reiterated that the prevention is the first antidote to prevent high blood pressure.

The number of blood pressure patients have increased in recent years whose main risk factor is aging, as 19.8 percent of the population is over 60 years of age.

This silent disease generates other complications, like heart and kidney conditions, visual impairment among others.

High blood pressure is the main risk factor of cardiovascular diseases provoking the death of over 35 thousand people each year.

Specialists warn on the risks of obesity, lack of exercise, bad eating habits and smoking cutting years of life due to lung, bronchial and trachea cancer among other areas of the body.

The specialist added that they expect success after the secondary intervention included in the project and reiterated that prevention is the first antidote to avoid high blood pressure.